Events

The Technoculture, Art and Games Research Centre (TAG) at Concordia University presents ‘Gaming Beyond Screens,’ a public symposium and arcade featuring digital games focused on physical interaction, movement and space.

Panel discussion

Workshop

Arcade Night

The event is free and will take place on Saturday Feb 9th from 3-5pm in EV1 – 615 – 1515 Ste Catherine St O

The symposium speakers include game designers, Bart Simon (TAG/Concordia), Doug Wilson (Die Gut Fabrik), Kaho Abe (Eyebeam Art and Techonology Centre) and Jim Toepel (Harmonix). The talks will cover these designers’ experiences and insights in creating experimental and non-traditional movement-based games that challenge prevailing ideas about what video games can and could be.

Following the talks, TAG will host a public arcade in the Hexagram Black Box (EV 0S3-845/855) featuring Hughes, Simon and Tingley’s Propinquity (http://propinquity.ca), Abe’s Hit-Me (http://kahoabe.net/?portfolio=hit-me), Die Gut Fabrik’s Joust (http://www.jsjoust.com/) and Harmonix’s Dance Central 3(http://www.dancecentral.com/game).

This event takes place as part of two day workshop on gestural game design sponsored by the Office of Research at Concordia University, the Faculty of Fine Arts, the Play and Performance project of the GRAND NCE and the Technoculture, Art and Games Research Centre.

Bios

Kaho Abe

I am a designer based in NYC interested in improving social and personal experiences through the use of technology, fashion and games.

I am currently a Computational Fashion Fellow at Eyebeam Art & Technology Center and the Artist in Residence at the Game Innovation Lab at NYU-Poly where I research and build games that utilize technology to bring people together face to face. Some of my projects include Hit Me!, Mary Mack 5000 and Ninja Shadow Warrior. I am currently working on a game that explores costumes as game controllers. My projects have appeared in shows and conferences in NYC, Boston, San Jose, the UK, Greece, China and Japan, and have been discussed in various publications including I.D. Magazine, Kill Screen Magazine, CNET News, NBC, NY1 and the Japanese newspaper, Asahi Shimbun.

I teach classes and workshops on designing and building alternative physical game controllers, and co-host a monthly playtesting event with Come Out and Play at Eyebeam. I hold a MFA in Design & Technology from Parsons the New School for Design and was formerly a Fellow at Eyebeam Art & Technology Center in NYC.

My other passions include film, music and day dreaming.

Hit Me!

Jim Toeple

“I like to make things. Especially when they make us better.”

After joining the Dance Central team to work on metagame/campaign/shell for Dance Central 2, Jim took over Lead Design duties for Dance Central 3 which is currently holding the spot as the highest-rated Kinect game of all time.

All this was after he finished a tour of duty with the Hardware Manufacturing team working on peripherals for The Beatles: Rock Band and Rock Band 3. Jim is really excited to be working on Harmonix games, blending his love of music, fitness and social “couch” gaming into a delicious dance-related stew.

Before joining Harmonix, Jim worked for The Boeing Company in various capacities, not limited to crawling over, under and inside the Space Shuttle. Carrying a BS in Material Science and a MS in Industrial/Systems Engineering, Jim tends to obsess over both the minutia and the big picture.

Outside of work Jim is an advocate for STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) education in Massachusetts, regaling grade-schoolers with stories from his time at Harmonix and his previous life as a rocket engineer at Kennedy Space Center.

For more info contact the TAG Coordinator Jane Tingley at 514-848-2424 X 4061 or at tag.coordinator@concordia.ca

Propinquity

http://finearts.concordia.ca/newsandevents/events/gaming-beyond-the-screens.php